There’s long been a common misconception about cat enthusiasts, and women who like cats in particular. Perhaps an image of someone with 20 cats surrounded by litter and kibble lingers in your mind, and you’re not alone: Pop culture has enforced the Halloween Mickey Witch Shirt moreover I will buy this idea of the “crazy cat lady,” with characters like the disheveled Eleanor Abernathy in The Simpsons and Robert De Niro’s unhinged, elderly cat lover on SNL.But times have changed: In recent years there’s been a humanization of pets—and more of an acceptance of them as people’s “children.” Businesses have leaned into that idea as well. Thanks to a cohort of stylish companies and influencers ready to help you “catify” your life, being a cat person is not only cool but an entire aesthetic.The idea of “catification”—or making changes to your home to suit you and your cat’s needs—has been precipitated by Hauspanther founder and cat style expert Kate Benjamin, who first became involved in the cat design space because she saw an untapped market in the pet category. But what started with a blog evolved into building a business around modern cat design, and turning it into a lifestyle. Benjamin wanted to not only get rid of the “crazy cat lady” trope, but do away with the idea that cat owners’ homes “must be covered in fur, and it’s gross, and you don’t care about how it looks.” It’s the opposite, Benjamin tells Vogue: “The modern cat person does care.”Josh Feinkind, founder of modern cat furniture outpost The Refined Feline, has seen more of an awareness that “alternatives to ugly shag-carpeted cat trees do exist,” which he attributes to social media. “The combination of cats and visually appealing designs is ‘catnip’ to users of platforms like Instagram and Pinterest, which in turn, boost awareness further,” he says of the trend.Jimmy Wu, co-founder of modern cat goods startup Cat Person, believes that what has helped normalize the feline fanatic’s aesthetic is making products for both the cat and their humans. In a survey Cat Person ran last year that quizzed consumers on cat products and furniture, Wu found that “people felt like they had to compromise within the category today,” meaning they couldn’t find a wide selection of cat furniture and they felt cat products were “underrepresented” in cat stores. “Over half of cat parents said they’ve bought products for their cat that are actually made for a small dog,” says Wu. That gap in the market, he believes, has also contributed to misconceptions about cats: “Cats have been largely ignored, so why they don’t have a great aesthetic today is [because] a lot of products and actually weren’t designed with cats in mind.”Cats, of course, don’t have an eye for design. But humans do, and they’re willing to spend the money to give their cats’ belongings a high-fashion feel to match their own. That can mean anything from a $400 cat tower to a $900 litter box and credenza. “Cat lovers want an attractive piece that is either cat furniture in disguise or is a work-of-art and center of attention in their room,” says Feinkeind. Of course, it will still be climbed on, clawed and scratched at, but at least it will look chic. The Refined Feline has seen its Lotus Cat Tower, with its bent-wood design, remain its bestseller, while its newer product—a modern, bookcase-style tower called the Metropolitan Cat Condo—has recently taken off.Jordanne Young, co-founder of Particular—a forthcoming slow commerce cat goods site that describes itself as a place for readers of CEREAL Magazine and Apartamento—aims to craft an even more targeted approach to cat furniture for sustainable, modern design lovers. “Everything is going to be made-to-order, small-batch, and this is so that there’s minimal-to-no waste, and even the potential to use leftovers to make something,” she says. Young says everything they will sell will be what they believe is essential for cats and cat owners, and they’ve ripped up the playbook for typical cat items, reimagining what they could look like if home decor was top of mind. “[Our products] be a scratching post, litter tray, cat bed, or some form of cat stool where a cat can reside, and then additional things that aren’t necessarily for the cat that are for more for the owner,” says Young. That means room scents, cat-related art prints, and gifts for cat lovers. With Particular, Young wants cat people who care about their home to have more optionsBeyond elevating the image of the cat person, creating a beautiful home with modern cat furniture is simply beneficial to your feline friends. “What I’ve done all along is I’ve tried to show people that the design of objects and environments can actually have a great impact on the health and well-being of your cat, as well as your relationship with the cat,” says Benjamin. “So it goes much further than just sort of looking good.”But it isn’t just modern cat furniture that has moved the needle for cat aficionados. In recent years celebrities have also helped fix the image problem the feline aficionado has long endured. Taylor Swift hasn’t been shy about sharing her Scottish folds Olivia Benson and Meredith Grey and her newest addition, a ragdoll named Benjamin Button, with the world. Swifties have in turn become fans of her cats over the years, so she’s taken to giving updates on them on social media. The majority of Gabourey Sidibe’s Instagram presence is dedicated to her cats Aaron and Derrell. Ian Somerhalder loves his cats so much he’s done several shoots with them—including one on the cover of People Magazine. Katy Perry’s cat, Kitty Purry, was her longtime mascot, and even made a cameo in her “I Kissed a Girl” video, until she died last year. The combination of hot, funny, famous people unabashedly loving their cats so much helped dispel the “uncool” cat person myth.There are other ways the cat person aesthetic has gotten a high-fashion makeover. The creation of PUSS PUSS Magazine, a luxury cat culture publication founded by Maria Joudina-Robinson, has produced lavish spreads featuring fabulous creatives from Grace Coddington and Chloë Sevigny to Ai Weiwei and Tyler, the Creator—and, of course, cats. In 2015, photographer BriAnne Wills began building a Humans of New York-type Instagram, but with cats, as a way to “redefine” what being a “cat lady” looked like. By featuring female-identifying creatives and their feline friends, she told the stories that brought them together on Instagram and via her website. She’s since released a stunning coffee table book of select images and profiles of the cat ladies she’s met throughout her journey. Then there’s Leah Goren’s book Catlady, for which the illustrator enlisted 25 women including actor Aidy Bryant, novelist Emma Straub, and designer Justina Blakeney, to create a love letter to cats through essays and artwork.It’s also fair to say the pandemic has been a factor in shifting the perception of cat people. Wu believes that cats are just having a long-overdue “moment.” “Millennials are now becoming or have become the largest group of both pet owners as well as cat owners, and I think a lot of them do approach the category a little bit differently,” he says. It’s something he attributes, in part, to an increase in adoptions and reliance on the animals for emotional support during COVID-19. The result of more people spending time at home, he says, is that the relationship between people and their cats has magnified. “Up to 60% of cat parents have actually relied on their cat for emotional support or comfort or last year, and I don’t think that’s surprising just given all the things that have happened out in the world,” he adds. Young believes that since we’ve become so dependent on social media throughout the pandemic, it’s helped cat people gain more visibility. “We’ve spent the past year living so closely with our animals, [and] that has been the content that people are sharing on Instagram,” she says. The cat person aesthetic isn’t going anywhere anytime soon; if anything, it’s on the road to becoming the status quo.
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Sabine Marcelis’s new Boa pouf looks like a doughnut. Or perhaps like its namesake snake, if that snake was a cheery child’s cartoon character who decided to curl up by some cozy fireplace. This is not meant to be a reductive description: Marcelis, after all, is a preeminent designer of objets d’art—her cast-resin foundations for Fendi proved so popular at Design: Miami that fair-goers queued up outside the Halloween Mickey Witch Shirt moreover I will buy this booth. And the pouf is in fact an impressive feat of engineering: despite being covered in knit fabric, there’s no visible seam. “I don’t want to do anything unless it’s perfect,” Marcelis says.But the stylish design is comforting in its chunkiness, just like a delectable breakfast pastry on a lazy Sunday morning. Originally, Marcelis placed her pouf by the bookshelf to add some visual interest to an otherwise bare space. Yet she soon found herself nestling her baby son in its capacious curves when, faced with furious multi-tasking, she needed to put him down in a pinch. “It can live in the space as more of a sculptural object,” she says, “but it can also be more of a resting stop.”Marcelis has been playing with that shape for awhile. For a recent charity auction, she crafted mini versions from extra resin from the studio. They were beautiful but hard. When she was approached by Hem almost two years ago, she decided a soft version was in order. Soon after, the pandemic hit, and Marcelis was spending more time at home than ever. Her flexible design, she realized, had particular resonance in this housebound world.Puffy, plump designs have been everywhere of late. First came the re-release of Mario Bellini’s bulbous Camaleonda Sofa from B&B Italia—which quickly became an (expensive) Instagram trend. Next came Faye Toogood’s Puffy Lounge chair, whose pleasantly plump pad runneth over its frame. The offering, also released via Hem, was so popular that they’re quickly reissuing it in an eggshell and sawdust boucle. Sales for Michel Ducaroy’s classic Togo Sofa for Ligne Roset, which looks like an elegant Eric Carle very hungry caterpillar after he’s eaten a whole lot, were up 203 percent in March. Yabu Pushelberg just released their Pukka collection, which include a sofa, chair, and ottoman made out of foam and crafted into a soft, spongy shape. Then there’s Milana’s Masand chair—made out of artful bolster cushions—which is captivating the eye of the high-design world.Now, the category of “puffy” is admittedly a wide-ranging one—the Boa Pouf and Bellini sofa, for example, have a number of glaring aesthetic differences. (Here’s our best attempt at a definitive categorization: anything that looks like it belongs in the home of the Michelin Man or Pillsbury doughboy.) It’s a design canon that might not hold its weight ten or 20 years from now—many of these pieces belong to other distinct design movements anyway—but in this very moment, we are certainly gravitating to everything thick and squishy. It’s a shift from recent predilections: Mid-century modern, the design style du jour of the past decade, is known for its clean, geometric lines and visible peg legs. These gentle, curved offerings are anything but. “There’s been quite a dramatic shift with the popularity of the rounded shape furniture. It’s trickled from bigger pieces like sofas and chairs to even coffee tables and sculptures,” says interior designer Erick Garcia of Maison Trouvaille.Just as structured jackets and tight pants went to the wayside last March, it seems so did any sleek and stiff furniture. “During our quarantine last year, we all spent so much time at home working on our laptops, Zooming and being domesticated—furniture had to be more cozy and inviting while lounging in our sweat suits,” Garcia says. It only increased amid political and social unrest: “We wanted to be comforted by these round, curved and tactile chairs and sofas—almost like receiving a big soft hug,” Garcia adds. While recently decorating celebrity hairstylist Jen Atkins’ Los Angeles home, Garcia sourced a pair of squishy, circular Pacha armchairs for the bedroom, along with an Afra & Tobia Scarpa sofa for the living space.Now that the world is opening up again, will puffy and plump pieces be here to stay? “The trend will definitely continue and evolve,” Garcia says, although perhaps don’t plan for a complete overhaul of your mid-century look: “There’s room for both—the beauty and fun of design is that we can mix it all together.”
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